EVERYONE ONSTAGE

ENLACE ARTE CONTEMPORÁNEO Gallery (Av. Pardo y Aliaga 676, San Isidro) announces the opening of the solo exhibition TODOS A ESCENA by the Argentinian master SERGIO CAMPOREALE, next April 15.
The artist was born in 1937 in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Camporeale graduated from the Escuela de Bellas Artes in 1961, and presented his first exhibition in 1963. He formed part of the Grupo Grabas, together with other renowned artists, and it was there that he would engage in an intense artistic output that would lead him to exhibit at important galleries and cultural centers in Latin America and Europe: Israel, Poland, France, Germany, Sweden, Italy, Belgium, Yugoslavia, Norway, Spain, Panama, Chile, Colombia, the United States, Venezuela, Uruguay, El Salvador, and Argentina. His oeuvre and career have been recognized with the following prizes: Gran Premio de Honor at the Salón Nacional de Artes Visuales, Buenos Aires, Argentina (2000); the Premio Habib Gargour Contemporary Art Prize in Montecarlo, Monaco (1990);the International Painting Festival Award, France (1987); First Prize at the Ibero-American Art Biennale in Cali, Colombia (1986); Third Prize at the Ibero-American Art Biennale, Mexico (1980); Grand Prize at the Salón Municipal of Buenos Aires, Argentina (1972); and the Silver Medal at the Ibero-American Art Biennale in Cali, Colombia (1971), among others.
On this occasion, the artist will present a group of eleven works made using oil on canvas and four watercolors and mixed techniques on poster board, primarily medium in size. Of a surrealistic and disturbing nature, this exhibition brings us a repertoire full of figures with frozen smiles, mocked and mocking, immersed in stories that seem to continue from one work to the next. Camporeale succeeds in making the spectator involve himself in that intimate space, rooting for one of the protagonists there. Pain, morbid curiosity, and satire, situations that abound in modern societies, are clearly reflected in the works of this artist.
Of his oeuvre, the following has been said: “Sergio Camporeale clips, edits, and assembles a delirious montage typical of the most terrible and fascinating of nightmares. The spectator experiences a noticeable bewilderment before the artist’s paintings, and finds himself forced to attempt interpretations that might relieve his uncertainty. In this way, the works promote active interlocutors. Camporeale’s paintings look like scenes from a luxuriant theater, whose actors, disconnected from one another, have emptied out their gazes. Some of his creatures suffer the superimposition of unreconcilable parts of other beings, playing with a lack of definition and sexual ambiguity. Their distorted bodies feature prostheses, suffering mutations and extravagant symmetries. In this strange atmosphere of simulation and mockery, there emerge inoffensive, childlike elements which—in this dynamic of constant transformation—threaten to turn into infernal machines (…) Through their madness, the figures exhibit the equivocalness of our existence. They recreate the pathetic situations inherent to the most absurd and trivial aspects of human nature. We see only appearances and fictions like a theater stage, pure spectacle, just fireworks.” (Corinne Sacca Abadi, art critic).
“In the intermingling of provocations of memory and bittersweet, sarcastic observations of reality, Camporeale assembles a tiny stage filled with automatons, tightrope walkers, mutants, minotaurs, merry-go-round pigs, curvaceous women and well-groomed leading men with neatly-kept beards and their hair slicked back—who would have thought?!—with hair gel, an updated version of Carlos Gardel’s look. Every last one of the protagonists maintains their composure. They are beautiful and pristine, unflappable even as they howl or undergo multiple metamorphoses, elegant eyesores worthy of a latter day bestiary, which Camporeale renders plausible.” (Elba Pérez, exhibition presentation catalogue).
The exhibition may be viewed through May 7, 2009, Monday through Saturday, 11:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m.